Final Project Menu

Here are links so you can read about my high school English class Literary Blog Project. This is a year-long project, but I describe the initial lesson for this project in greater detail and provide some possible topics for follow-on lessons. Thanks in advance for participating in the survey and giving me feedback on my lesson.

Content Standards [LINK]
Content Instruction [LINK]
Lesson Structure [LINK]
Rubric/Assessment of Student Performance [LINK]
Technology [LINK]
Survey [LINK]

Final Project Menu

Here are links so you can read about my high school English class Literary Blog Project. This is a year-long project, but I describe the initial lesson for this project in greater detail and provide some possible topics for follow-on lessons. Thanks in advance for participating in the survey and giving me feedback on my lesson.

Content Standards [LINK]
Content Instruction [LINK]
Lesson Structure [LINK]
Rubric/Assessment of Student Performance [LINK]
Technology [LINK]
Survey [LINK]

Favorite YouTube Clip

I showed this YouTube clip of a Ukrainian sand animation artist to my 8th grade English students last semester. They found it very inspirational and I hope you do, too!

New York Unit Survey Results

">Here are the results of the New York Survey Unit. Thanks for participating.

Final Project Technology

Technology used in this project includes:

• Computers with Internet access
• Internet literary-related websites suggested by teacher
• A free blogsite such as blogger or livejournal

Students will publish blogposts, maintain the class blog and participate in the online literary community as a way to display their literary analysis and writing skills.

Technology will be a powerful teacher and, hopefully, motivator, during this year-long project. Ultimately, students will learn to value the skills of literary analysis and to understand that those skills can carry them beyond school walls into book-related careers.

Final Project Rubric

Students will be assessed on each of the following criteria based on the following rubric:

Level 1: incomplete

Level 2: developing

Level 3: satisfactory

Level 4: accomplished

Level 5: exemplary

• Blog Post #1: Completed on time
• Blog Post #1: Content meets required length
• Blog Post #1: Presents a brief literary analysis using clear, error-free English
• Blog Post #2: Completed on time
• Blog Post #2: Content meets required length
• Blog Post #2: Presents a brief literary analysis using clear, error-free English
• Blog Comment #1: Posted on approved website
• Blog Comment #1: Completed on time
• Blog Comment #1: Presents a thoughtful response in clear, error-free English
• Blog Comment #2: Posted on approved website
• Blog Comment #2: Completed on time
• Blog Comment #2: Presents a thoughtful response in clear, error-free English
• Blog Maintenance: Week completed when scheduled.
• Blog Maintenance: Weekly sitemeter report completed and sent to teacher by Friday of assigned week.
• Blog Maintenance: Responds thoughtfully in clear, error-free English to comments posted on blog.
• Blog Maintenance: Presents five-minute Blog status report to class at end by Friday of assigned week.

Final Project Lesson Structure

Lesson Structure

• This will be an on-going, year-long project in which students will participate individually to create and maintain a literary blog that reflects the content of the class. The approximate time that each student will spend on this blog by year's end should be a total of ten to fifteen hours, split between homework and in-class work.
• At the start of the school year, there will be an introductory Webquest-based lesson where students will spend a 50-minute lesson navigating the web to become familiar with literary websites. They will complete a brief assessment answering specific questions about content found at the following websites. (These are websites they can use to satisfy the project requirement to post at least two thoughtful comments at a literary website.):

Open Letters Monthly http://openlettersmonthly.com/blog/
Three Percent http://www.rochester.edu/College/translation/threepercent/index.php
The Second Pass http://thesecondpass.com/?page_id=24
Critical Mass http://www.bookcritics.org/blog
Conversational Reading http://www.conversationalreading.com/
American Fiction Notes http://americanfiction.wordpress.com/
Maud Newton http://maudnewton.com/blog/
Blog of Bookslut http://www.bookslut.com/blog/
Bookforum http://www.bookforum.com/
Mobylives http://mhpbooks.com/mobylives/
The Reading Experience http://noggs.typepad.com/

• At the end of the Webquest lesson, teacher will distribute to students a year-long calendar (also posted on SchoolLoop) which shows their individual deadlines for their two blog posts, two blog comments and their required week of in-class blog maintenance. Students will be instructed to send links of completed work to teacher via SchoolLoop.
• A follow-up lesson will be needed to create the class blog and the student accounts on a free site such as blogger or livejournal.
• Depending on class knowledge and interest, teacher might conduct follow-up lessons throughout the year on Internet etiquette, how to increase blog traffic, etc.
• Resources required for this project is a computer with Internet access and a valid SchoolLoop account. Students without access to a home computer will be given time during weekly tutorials to complete and upload work using the computer lab's computer.

Final Project Content Instruction

Objectives

At the end of this on-going, year-long lesson, students will have published and maintained as a class a relevant living literary journal (blog) that reflects the spirit of the class and what they are studying. Over the course of the year, each student will:

• Write and publish on the class blog at least two content-rich, 500-word essays based on his or her critical analysis of two different novels.
• Demonstrate his or her knowledge of literary web sources, such as blogs, online versions of print journals, ezines, and reader community forums, etc. by posting at least two concise and thoughtful responses on approved literary websites.
• Spend at least one week of the school year maintaining the class blog by uploading student essays, monitoring site traffic using an application such as Sitemeter, and responding to comments posted from the online community.
  

Final Project Menu Selection

Here are links so you can read about my high school English class Literary Blog Project. This is a year-long project, but I describe the initial lesson for this project in greater detail and provide some possible topics for follow-on lessons. Thanks in advance for participating in the survey and giving me feedback on my lesson.


Content Standards [LINK]
Content Instruction [LINK]
Lesson Structure [LINK]
Rubric/Assessment of Student Performance [LINK]
Technology [LINK]
Survey [LINK]

Favorite Inspirational YouTube Clip

Hi, everyone!

I used this YouTube clip of a Ukranian sand animation artist last fall to inspire the 8th graders I was teaching to think about the narratives they were writing in a creative way. Enjoy!

Podcast Link

One of the book publisher's who keeps me supplied with excellent books to review is Open Letter. Here's a link to a podcast from the MLA convention about the word of international literature.

Survey

Powerpoint: EB White's Here is New York

On Tuesday, I will be working with my reading class on an excerpt from E.B. White's essay, Here is New York. I created this powerpoint that pairs the text we will be discussing with images that will help the students connect to the text and to New York City.

Here Is New York

View more presentations from karen vanuska.